The one word that comes to mind when I think of my brother is ‘courage’. By this I don’t mean the lack of fear which some people have, which enables them to do very dangerous or frightening things because they have no idea what it is to be afraid. I mean a courage which overcomes real fear, while actually experiencing it.

Christopher Hitchens was a complete one-off, an amazing mixture of writer, journalist, polemicist, and unique character. He was fearless in the pursuit of truth and any cause in which he believed. And there was no belief he held, that he did not advocate with passion, commitment and brilliance. He was an extraordinary, compelling and colourful human being whom it was a privilege to know.

His unworldly fluency never deserted him, his commitment was passionate, and he never deserted his trade. He was the consummate writer, the brilliant friend. In Walter Pater’s famous phrase, he burned „with this hard gem-like flame“. Right to the end.

Hitchens’ writing style defied editorial intervention. Consequently, he reduced editors to fact-checkers. He had a prodigious memory, but his head wasn’t just stuffed with lines of poetry and tables of arcane facts: Apparently, he could also recall chunks of prose from the New York Times more or less accurately. Shortly after the news of Sen. Larry Craig’s arrest in an airport men’s room broke, Hitchens filed the piece that for me best exemplifies the breadth of his interests and the completeness of his recall—it contained quotes from an obscure academic work, recollections of hilariously profane bathroom graffiti, remembered conversations with British politicians, and lines of satirical verse published decades earlier.

Christopher was the beau ideal of the public intellectual. You felt as though he was writing to you and to you alone. And as a result many readers felt they knew him. Walking with him down the street in New York or through an airplane terminal was like escorting a movie star through the throngs.

Last year I asked him if he would talk to a young writer, Graham Moore, who had just signed with Jonathan Karp at Hitch’s publisher, TWELVE. Hitch guided Moore through the publication of the best selling novel, The Sherlockian. During a book party for The Sherlockian at Vice President Biden’s home, Moore got to meet and thank Hitch for his mentoring. Despite serious health challenges, Hitch was determined to go and finally meet his protégé in person; and in the company of all who glitter in Washington no one twinkled more than Hitch, with Carol and his kids at his side.

I‘d asked him last year to write a letter to the Immigration Services sponsoring me to finally become a permanent resident of the United States. Who better than my fellow Englishman immigrant of the last 25 years? A while later, he emailed:

“Safely in the U.S. mail. I managed to say that your faith had allowed you to extend a warm hand to so many of your fellow men, and then remolded that bit to make it sound a touch less close to the heart’s desire.

Brunch? Sunday? Smooch Hitch”

I responded,

“lol. many many many thanks. an honor. brunch sounds great. we tend not to be conscious till around noon, tho. xx a”

He replied:

“Dearest Andrew I always think of Sunday lunch as beginning at about 2.30 („a lavish and ruminative feast“, as Waugh says about elevenses). Want to come here?”

The gig was a big ‚un, relatively speaking. 4000 people. Great vibe… (man). Only spoiled by a few drunken English cunts asserting their Englishness down the front. Why do English people insist on doing that?? It’s embarrassing… No wonder everyone hates them. Top night all the same.